Despite having the bulk of possession and leading at half-time, the Otters were unable to prevent the league leaders, Tonmawr, from maintaining their 100 per cent record and notching up their fifth league win on the trot.

On an afternoon made for rugby, the spectators at the Lewis Lloyd Ground were treated to an excellent game between two good sides, which gripped attention spans until the final whistle. The visitors suffered an early blow in the first minute when outside-half Rob Evans, the son of former Welsh international and British Lion fullback Gwyn Evans, was injured, but his replacement, Austin Howells, proved to be a more than capable deputy.

After being off target with a drop-goal attempt, Narberth outside-half Aled Davies kicked a penalty after 19 minutes to give the Otters a deserved lead. Ten minutes later, it was extended by Davies with another penalty, which went over the bar off the posts, but Tonmawr clawed back three points after 30 minutes when Austin Howells slotted over a short-range penalty.

During the half-time interval, Narberth supporters' club treasurer, Geoff Morgan, presented a cheque for £2,000 to Otters' chairman, John Owen.

In making the presentation, Mr. Morgan said that the money had been raised through their weekly meat draw and the raffles at home league matches. He thanked all of the supporters' club officials for their involvement in the fund raising and Narberth supporters for contributing so generously. In accepting the donation, John Owen, a former Otters player himself and the holder of the record for the most first team appearances for the club, said that the club management was most grateful to the work done by the supporters' club and that the generous donation would be a big help towards the general funding of the club. Tonmawr had a chance to level the scores at the start of the second half, but Austin Howells missed a short-range penalty kick.

However, the visitors had come out with a bang and took the lead following good work by the pack from a lineout, when hooker Adrian Phillips went over in the right corner for an unconverted try.

Aled Davies regained the lead for the Otters with an opportunist drop-goal. He tried to extend the lead with two ambitious penalty attempts minutes later. One of the kicks was from just inside the halfway line and the other from inside his own half. Both kicks had the legs, but not the accuracy. Aled Davies regained the lead with a penalty from just outside the 22. Trailing by four points, Tonmawr came back into the game with more good work by their pack in a lineout following a penalty which enabled hooker Adrian Phillips to be driven over for a try in the left corner.

The difficult conversion was kicked by Austin Howells to give Tonmawr a lead of three points. The Otters gave everything to get back in the game and had an extra player when Tonmawr winger Ricky Price was yellow-carded and the visitors played all of the injury time with 14 players. The Otters made the most of this shortfall in numbers and created three scoring opportunities during that time. When a penalty was awarded to the Otters following the yellow card issued to Ricky Price, Narberth outside-half Aled Davies shaped up to kick the resulting penalty into touch, but was asked to go for the three points by kicking a goal. Unfortunately for the Narberth supporters, he was just wide of the mark with a difficult kick.

It did not deter the Narberth players. Throughout the afternoon the Tonmawr defence had been rock solid, but Narberth skipper and fullback Sion Brace found a way through when he chipped the ball over the top of the defenders.

He followed up and managed to retrieve the ball, but his pass inside did not find a teammate and the Otters missed a glorious opportunity to score when the Tonmawr defenders were outnumbered. With the last kick of the game Aled Davies had a penalty opportunity from the 40-metre line. Once again he had the distance, but tantalisingly the ball was sliced just to the right of the posts.

Commenting after the match, Narberth team manager Robert Lewis said: "It was an excellent game in good conditions with both teams attempting to throw the ball around. It was disappointing that we did not get anything out of it apart from a bonus point and right at the end we had three scoring opportunities, two penalties and one try, which could have won us the game or at least levelled the scores. "We had opportunities to score, but did not take all of them, whereas in contrast Tonmawr took everything that came their way. "We played most of the rugby, but that is the way it is and full credit must go to the Narberth players. "We stood up to them up front. Tonmawr have a very strong all-round team and in many ways, although they had a lot of stars in the backs, we outplayed them.

"There were good performances by both Narberth centres Richard Davies and Steve Martin, fullback Sion Brace had an excellent game and generally the backs defended well and looked dangerous in attack without quite having the rub of the green. "The pack played well in the set-pieces and the loose and it was a good all-round performance. "All of the Narberth players stuck at it and if they play like that each week the team management will be very happy".

Second row Tristan Bowen was nominated man-of- the-match by the match sponsors, Coors Brewers and the Templeton Supporters.

The match ball was sponsored by the RAOB Social Club, Kilgetty, the RAOB Social Club, Narberth, Cynthia and Ian Evans, of Narberth, Penry Harris, of Princes Gate, Graham Searle, of Llawhaden, the Landshipping Boys and the Pwll Trap Boys. Tomorrow (Saturday), Narberth travel to Whitland for the first local derby of the league season and Narberth Athletic will entertain Whitland Wanderers at home in the Polypipe Civils Championship West Wales Premier League.

The game between the two second teams may be brought forward to an earlier kick-off time of 12 noon so that the players can watch their first team counterparts in action at Whitland.

Narberth fielded: Sion Brace (capt.), Tom Bonnell, Steve Martin, Richard Davies, Andrew Jones, Aled Davies, Andrew Davies, Ryan Perrott (Tom Slater), Dan Smith, Justin Hughes, Tristan Bowen, Jason Jennings, Gareth Bateman (Jamie Bohata), Andrew Dennis and Lloyd Phillips.